Race suspended due to the weather - its gotta be pretty grim for that to happen
_________________Gin Pit Double Marathons, Manchester Marathon, Thames Path 100, South Downs Way 100, North Downs Way 100, Berlin Marathon, Autumn 100

Race suspended due to the weather - its gotta be pretty grim for that to happen

eioan (sp?) turned back for snow shoes (!) shortly before he dropped out, saw the videos of pavel pushing through knee deep drifts.... did wonder if eioan might have done things differently or want to re-start after an enforced night's rest.

pavel has a massive lead now with those drop outs assuming he doesn't have any serious issues.
_________________Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement [C.S. Lewis]

(I won't post name or race number since it actually links a real person to a pseudo on here. That'll be SS's decision if he wants to do that later. If you really want you can probably dig it out yourselves or PM me.)

He went over Cross Fell last night which was epic by the sounds of it. Waist deep snow in places, -15C windchill, and he and people around him ended up dragging two others to the small bothy at the top for doctor's help, including one who they had to take back 1.5 miles after starting from said bothy and then they had to re-start again. Seriously hard stuff.

He's tired but on the trail again this morning after a lie-in. If he can eat enough today he'll hopefully be able to recover some of the losses from last night and continue, but it'll be a hard day mentally.

As mentioned, if this race gets stopped due to weather it's really, really bad. They don't stop easily. Proper epic stuff, well impressive.

The kit check stuff was down to goggles not being deemed adequate. Only thing to use seems to be ski masks, but I think they were rushing out some masks for the guys who were lacking to enable them to continue and avoid DQs. Fair play to the organisers, they do try.
_________________Where the mind goes the body follows.

Anyone run the Thames trot this weekend then? I heard it was a bit of a slop fest!!

Just a few days to go until my big race, and it’s driving me insane! I always get mega impatient and distracted in the last couple of weeks before a big race that I have been targeting. It seems that that is even worse with an ultra, as I wasn’t even tired from the training to make the most of the taper.

Training has been pretty weird for it really. Quickly scrapped my uber unrealistic plan I wrote within a couple of weeks, and just went for the ‘whatever I can fit in, whenever I can and as long as it is fun and doesn’t disrupt family life’ approach. The WIF WIC LIF DDF. Catchy eh!

Looking back I’ve averaged 52km per week for 18 weeks, with an average elevation of 1,231. Two runs over 50km, both at night and with ~20m/km elevation on terrible terrain (i.e. blimmin wet!). That then interspersed with as much time as possible on the coast path, and a few harder workouts on the roads when I have felt like it. I’m also the heaviest I have been in a while – down to not being so careful with my diet since Xmas, but I’m not going to worry about that.

Biggest thing I have learned – poles are a godsend over this distance and terrain.

My wife is getting fed up now though – “I hate it when you’re close to an event, because your brain is only ever, at most, switched 50% on to anything outside running!”. Yeah not far wrong there! Oops. Even finding it hard to concentrate in work, unfortunately that is tying in with a particularly boring project in work at the mo.

Bag has been test packed with all mandatory kit - wasn’t sure if it was going to get in to my small race vest, but it fits just fine! Spare kit all cleaned and ready to go, just need to do my super unhealthy and frankly ridiculous tesco shop now – a trolley full of crisps, cake, chocolate, dried fruit and various junk food! You should see the menus for the aid stations though, they’re epic!

I keep getting asked If I’m ready for it, and if my training has gone well. My honest answer is always – I have no idea how to train for it, and I’m as ready as I’ll ever be. We’ll find out this weekend!

Latest of my silly training events... had the option of gpx on my garmin but wanted to make it a nav exercise so stuck with paper and compass even when tempted to check the breadcrumb trail on the way back.

At least as much ascent as a fandance, cold and drizzly to start through to windy and low vis later on. Large sections of path not to map or at least not visible on the ground, with uneven tussocky grass and bogs (which I also went thigh deep in a couple).
Oh and the river crossing was knee deep on the way out and mid thigh on the way back... final steep ravine climb was unrecognisable basically up now running water.

All in happy with my nav and result and my legs seem to be responding and adapting to the training load nicely.

Good luck with the arc GB.. make sure to pack plenty of pies
Say hi to Dave but do it early cos he might not make it far (as usual)
_________________Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement [C.S. Lewis]

Anyone run the Thames trot this weekend then? I heard it was a bit of a slop fest!!

Just a few days to go until my big race, and it’s driving me insane! I always get mega impatient and distracted in the last couple of weeks before a big race that I have been targeting. It seems that that is even worse with an ultra, as I wasn’t even tired from the training to make the most of the taper.

Training has been pretty weird for it really. Quickly scrapped my uber unrealistic plan I wrote within a couple of weeks, and just went for the ‘whatever I can fit in, whenever I can and as long as it is fun and doesn’t disrupt family life’ approach. The WIF WIC LIF DDF. Catchy eh!

Looking back I’ve averaged 52km per week for 18 weeks, with an average elevation of 1,231. Two runs over 50km, both at night and with ~20m/km elevation on terrible terrain (i.e. blimmin wet!). That then interspersed with as much time as possible on the coast path, and a few harder workouts on the roads when I have felt like it. I’m also the heaviest I have been in a while – down to not being so careful with my diet since Xmas, but I’m not going to worry about that.

Biggest thing I have learned – poles are a godsend over this distance and terrain.

My wife is getting fed up now though – “I hate it when you’re close to an event, because your brain is only ever, at most, switched 50% on to anything outside running!”. Yeah not far wrong there! Oops. Even finding it hard to concentrate in work, unfortunately that is tying in with a particularly boring project in work at the mo.

Bag has been test packed with all mandatory kit - wasn’t sure if it was going to get in to my small race vest, but it fits just fine! Spare kit all cleaned and ready to go, just need to do my super unhealthy and frankly ridiculous tesco shop now – a trolley full of crisps, cake, chocolate, dried fruit and various junk food! You should see the menus for the aid stations though, they’re epic!

I keep getting asked If I’m ready for it, and if my training has gone well. My honest answer is always – I have no idea how to train for it, and I’m as ready as I’ll ever be. We’ll find out this weekend!

Sorry for the ramble, just trying to direct some pent up energy!

Just had a look at the route\live tracker, 100 miles is quite a long way when you look at it on a map!!

I'm sure your brain will be switched on at the weekend, I know the general rule in an ultra is eat what you can keep down.

Hope it goes well, I'll probably keep an eye on the tracker over the weekend.

I'm alive and well. I'll write something up a bit later when i have 10 mins spare.

It'll probably wpould've been a very different read had i written it on Saturday night, or even Sunday!

That truly was on another level though. I don't think i was underprepared, per se, but i definitely underestimated it! The terrain was just horrendous, the wet winter turned half the course into a quagmire. The winners were something like 2.5 hours down on their time last year (they've won it 4 years in a row i think).

A top 20 finish (not that that means a great deal), a gold buckle for going under 30 hrs (only the two winners went under 24 for the black buckle) and a dnf rate of about 65% i think. Blinkin bonkers!

I have to say though, it was the slickest race i've ever done. They really have you covered on every angle and with a volunteer ratio of almost 1:1 you can't ask for any more!!!

28:30 for me. I didn't charge my watch properly on the go, so it died on one of the long sections. I didn't see the point in setting it going again a couple of hours later, so my strava file is missing a fair chunk here: https://www.strava.com/activities/1402670163

Though this link is my friends. We ran side by side until the last 10km where he gained 20 mins or so on me (my ankle was done in and he had a new lease of life, so i told him to crack on): https://www.strava.com/activities/1400980193

Last edited by gingerbongo on Tue Feb 13, 2018 10:39 am; edited 1 time in total